January 2001

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Because of the abundance of Macroing in RWK we were forced to rebuild it with some anti-macro code. Those detected macroing will have their IP’s banned from the entire Glitchless site, forfeiting their chance of betatesting. As of 9pm Eastern the RWK Player Database has been reset, and we invite all of you to participate in good clean fun 🙂

Imagine that, Racewar Kingdoms, which in a master stroke of design and coding managed to boil down the quintessential essence of massively multiplayer gaming into pushing the button repeatedly has found that people will automate repeatedly pushing a button. Its incredible that no other gaming company has ever had an experience like this but you know, that’s what you get for being on the leading edge of software development.

I guess that means they’ll be taking this banner off their website now?

Great news, everyone. We’re going to be resuming full coverage of Nintendo games on this channel!

As you may know, Nintendo issued a lawsuit against our parent company for allegedly violating certain Nintendo trademarks and copyrights in a Pokemon guide which competed with one of their official guides. We were puzzled by their action, and while our lawyers reviewed Nintendo’s allegations, as a safety measure we decided not to risk any other coverage of Nintendo products in case Nintendo found further reason to sue.

But having reviewed the situation, our legal team have confirmed that our use of Nintendo images on Daily Radar was and remains completely legal, and so they have given us the go ahead to resume usual coverage.

Hopefully this won’t affect our ability to bring you Nintendo news in the future and we’re just glad the legal eagles have sorted things out for Daily Radar. Sorry you guys had to suffer for this brief interlude, and tomorrow, things will be right back to normal!

Yours Sincerely,

Frank O’Connor

Executive Producer

Daily Radar

I have brushed away the dust from the long forgotten UNIVERSAL TRANSLATOR, and as is the custom, fed this press release into the loading tray. Oddly enough, a snorilak plushy doll came out, but in that little nappy guy’s paw was the following document:

So we figured you guys would like, rally around our flag majorettes and join the big parade down on SuperMario Street. But noooooo, you had to be all big and bad and come down here and read the legal documents we posted (well, except for that Arcadian Del Sol guy. He’s a good little soldier).

So basically, with the truth being all out there and stuff, we tried to spin things around, but still it looks like Arcadian Del Sol has been too deeply brainwashed by the likes of BruceR and others.

So like, fine then. We decided to talk to our lawyers and you know what they said? Well first they said, “who are you again?” and then they said, “uhm. I don’t remember anything being said about your little fansite, there.”

So in the days to come, after we restore all our Nintendo coverage from tape, we’ll be back in action to bring you all the latest news. Word on the street is that Pokemon Arena is the bizzomb!

This isn’t “news” by any stretch of the imagination, but I thought enough of our readers might have on opinion on Gamespot’s Question of the Week, which this week is “What game convention would you like to see changed in 2001?”. Better yet, they might actually want to discuss the issue…

Sega, despite ceasing production on the Dreamcast has a MMOG in development specifically for the Dreamcast. The Gaming Intelligence Agency and IGN-DC report that the game is scheduled for release this summer and will be an “online-only experience.” I wish I could tell you more or even describe the game for you but there aren’t many details available. A quick search of Sega’s website could not find any mention of the game.

I’m really not sure if this counts as selling out or not, because if Lum and Company’s intentions were to get to me stop drawing them doing patently stupid things in goofy parody comics by hiring me on, well, they failed completely. :>

Anyway, hi. I’m Brent and I have marching orders to occasionally draw MMOGish things for here and what-not whenever I have the inspiration to. For the moment, that involves finishing ‘The Comics of Lum the Mad’. I’m not quite certain yet what you’ll see in the way of future projects from me — I really don’t have the time to crank out any sort of daily comic. Graduate school keeps a person busy like that.

So I might stick to editorial-type cartoons regarding things MMOGish. Or I might perpetuate TCoLtM into a quasi-serial sort of thing beyond what I have planned, because when I think about it, a thing like “D.C. Follies meets the MMOG industry” would be a hell of a lot of fun to draw. :>

‘course, with my luck I’ll just wind up being a Cafepress bitch or something. Le sigh.

Kevin Jenkins, a contributor to MPOG.COM wrote an article on 1/22/00 (note: probably a typo) in which he suggests the solution to problems in Ultima Online such as PKing and lack of housing space can be solved by PRESSING THE SHARD RESET BUTTON EVERY YEAR. Basically, he proposes a 12 month version of Age of Empires. First player to collect all the magic beans wins, shard wiped shortly thereafter. The only problem is that his article seems to indicate that he has yet to see DAY ONE of Ultima Online in preparation for his thesis. Take the first paragraph for example:

Joe Newbie walks into the local CompUSA and sees an old copy of Ultima Online for $20. “What a deal!” he thinks. It’s always been his fantasy to be a mighty swordsman with his own castle to dominate the landscape. He buys the game, eventually creates a character, and a new warrior enters the world of Britannia. His first sight, a massive gray fortress dominating the landscape. “Wow, look at that castle!” he exclaims aloud. A few clicks and his avatar walks across the screen gazing in admiration at a keep. “Whoa, another one!” he thinks. A few more clicks. “Another castle? Hail fellow!” he types in greeting as a black clad player steps out from behind a tree. The text “Vas corp por!” appears above the strange fellow’s head and Joe Newbie enters the ghost world for the first time. “OoO Oo OOO” he says, although he actually typed “WTF is this?” Over the next week our poor adventurer spends hours trying to make 100 GP (only to come across a cache of 100,000 behind a tree), and eventually quits in disgust because everyone BUT him has full plate with level eight spells, a house, and millions of GP. His last words, “Twas all for naught. I shall spent nary another moment in the land of Britannia.”

For those of you who have only been playing UO for the past year or so, you’re probably thinking to yourself, “What game was this guy playing?” Well, we technically was playing Ultima Online, but I would guess at most, two hours in one sitting over a year and a half ago – but I’m fairly certain I’m being generous with that estimate. I have been playing UO for three years now – SOMEONE TELL ME WHERE THE GOLD TREE IS PLZ! And for those who -did- find this boullion blossom, tell me if it made you want to quit in disgust. Oh, and here’s a tip: If it takes you several hours to make 100 GP in Ultima Online, might I suggest you try USING YOUR MOUSE? As for a day one newbie being PKed in the woods – could someone please let Kevin know that a young player has to really try *hard* to get to Felucca, and once there, won’t lose any of his possessions if he is killed? Thanks much!

I have a better solution, he continues, long term but not permanently persistent worlds. There should be a series of servers where each server has a unique goal that takes from one week to one year to complete. When the goal is completed, anything from ridding the land of a plague of monsters to destroying the gods, the world is created anew. The victorious player(s) can earn titles that carry over, perhaps with better titles the fewer players who accomplish the goal. So rather than 20 or so persistent servers in Everquest, have the servers recycle in a chain.

So let me see if I follow this. The solution to the complaint that Ultima Online and Everquest had nothing to achieve, nothing to explore, no bragging rights after the first six months (according to the article), is to erase all the accomplishments that players have attained, and reset the game periodically.

I don’t know about you, but if you remove the persistence from Ultima Online or EverQuest, you had better stop charging me a monthly fee for access. Maybe if Kevin Jenkins actually played Ultima Online or EverQuest, he’d feel a little less eager to have his tower on Sonoma deleted because some guy killed “The Big Foozle” last night.

To which end, I’m going to install EverQuest and play it for a month. I won’t keep the account because I can tell you right now – I wont like it. Not that I wont enjoy the KILL KILL KILL KILL *DING!* experience, but for me, if I cant use ICQ or run IRC while I’m playing the game, I won’t be playing it for very long. For me, these games are social games and I have yet to see one that allows me the same level of social interaction as ICQ or IRC. Ultima Online *tried* to incorporate both, but quickly repealed them when they proved to be as stable as a hyperactive child in a Mountain Dew jacuzzi. At least Ultima Online, for all its faults, allows me the ability to *MULTITASK*. If I want to play a game that doesn’t let me download email in the background, I’ll play something on my GameBoy.

I sent an e-mail over to the guys at Verant tonight because I wanted to give them a chance to tell their side of the Terris Thule story. Brad McQuaid, Executive Producer of EverQuest, was kind enough to respond with the following:

We found some artificially buffed and equipped characters who were illegally moved from the Test server to a live server. Those characters will be moved back to Test. The situation has been dealt with internally and we’ll do our best to not let something like this occur again.

Shortly after he wrote me he posted pretty much the same statement on Whineplay, much to the players delight.

Akriss stopped by Whineplay and said that the threads were being closed and deleted because they were getting ‘pretty rowdy’. The community just wants answers. I don’t think that qualifies as rowdy. After that brief statement, this was mentioned:

“also there will be no public comment regarding this issue from us …………..”

Why would Verant be so adamant about not issuing any comments on this? Complete silence in this case does not do them any good. It says that either they have no idea what is going on, or they know and they don’t want the player base to know anything. The players are already making assumptions that Verant employees are twinking their friends on live servers. This kind of practice isn’t completely uncommon, but it is normally restricted to the test server. With Verants unwillingness to make a comment you have to believe that it is a pretty plausible notion. If this is indeed the case then the right thing to do would be to just come out and say it. Let the players at least know so that they can move on. If they are already assuming it to be true then admitting it isn’t going to hurt anything.

I’m a little less impressed by what appears to be a bit of deception on the part of Verant. I’m not too sure what, exactly is going on here. Ester the Tester posted at the beginning of January that the Planes of Mischief would finally be available, a couple of weeks after the SOV release. Absor posted two days later that no, the Planes of Mischief were actually available but that no one had found them yet. Two days ago, Triton Guild finally finds the Planes (the first to do so, to my knowledge) and they find them incomplete. Ester showed up during their tour of the Planes and promised a patch tomorrow but that it is incomplete speaks that it may not have been there all along. That is something of a dissapointment, to say the least. I was extremely happy to find out that something that was supposed to be very hard to find was, in actuality, very hard to find. However all bets are off if it was actually nonexistent, which I suppose does fit the bill for being hard to find. When we are told that something is hard to find we expect it to, you know, really be available and not a promised feature for the future.

Granted, game companies releasing expansions without all features in place is nothing new. Nonetheless I hate to see this become a regular feature in the MMOG world. It just widens that gap between player and game company that much more and makes everyone trust each other a little less. Not something we really need to see in the already strained world of player/developer relations.

If you can access the Zone this morning, you can read the original text. If you can’t, like me, you can look at CoD’s news item on the topic. Either way, you’ll get the happy news that yesterday’s “dude, we can crash the server and dupe and stuff, and we won’t get in trouble for it because it’s Turbine’s fault we can do so” kiddies were actually banned for their sins.

The good news is that we were able to track down all the players who were exploiting this bug and crashing the servers. As we have stated in the past: Since Asheron’s Call was commercially released, it has been our policy that if players make use of a bug that we did not catch or did not have time to fix before releasing the game, we would not punish them for our mistake, instead directing our efforts toward fixing those bugs as soon as possible. The exceptions to this are with those bugs that significantly affect the performance or stability of the game.

Perhaps the problem wouldn’t have exploded in the first place if players wouldn’t haved believed that they have a license to exploit, merely by logging in. Nice work this time. Work harder next time.